Ever sat in a meeting with a brilliant subject matter expert (SME), frantically taking notes as they enthusiastically shared intricate details about your product's capabilities, only to walk away wondering how you'll transform that technical brilliance into content your audience will actually understand—let alone engage with?
Nearly 45% of marketers have the same problem, and lack a scalable model for content creation from expert knowledge. This leaves valuable insights trapped in the minds of specialists rather than in your marketing content.
How do you bridge the gap between complex expertise and accessible content that drives action? While your SMEs hold the knowledge that differentiates your business, their expertise often remains an untapped goldmine because marketing teams struggle to translate these insights effectively.
In this blog, we explore how marketers can collaborate with SMEs to turn complex expertise into clear, compelling content that resonates with your audience.
SME Content Creation Challenges
Subject matter experts bring deep knowledge, credibility, and authority to content, but aren't trained in marketing communication. They understand their domain intimately but struggle to explain it in a way that non-experts understand.
The disconnect is because:
- SMEs get into technical details that overwhelm non-experts
- They use jargon that creates barriers to understanding
- Their content often lacks the storytelling elements
- They prioritize accuracy over relevance to audience needs
Meanwhile, marketing teams have their own set of challenges, like:
- Limited access to SMEs' time and attention
- Difficulty extracting information in marketing-ready formats
- Struggles maintaining a balance between technical accuracy and accessibility
- Inefficient workflows for content review and approval
How to Make Complex Concepts Easier
Effective simplification isn't about "dumbing down" content—it's about making it accessible without losing substantive value.
Here are proven strategies for making complex expert information more digestible:
The "One Big Idea" Rule
Limit each content piece to one central concept, surrounded by supporting points. This principle prevents cognitive overload and helps readers focus on the most important takeaway.
Progressive Disclosure
Layer information by starting with a simple explanation, then gradually introducing more complex details for interested readers. This serves both executives seeking quick insights and technical evaluators who need depth.
Concrete Examples and Analogies
Abstract concepts become accessible when connected to familiar situations. Work with SMEs to develop relatable analogies that bridge the gap between specialized knowledge and everyday understanding.
Strategic Use of Technical Terms
Instead of eliminating technical terminology, introduce it strategically with clear definitions. This builds audience knowledge while maintaining credibility with technical evaluators.
Marketing tip: Create a "translation glossary" with your SMEs that provides simple explanations for complex terms—this becomes a valuable reference for your entire content team.
B2B Storytelling Frameworks for Expert Content
The most effective way to transform complex SME knowledge into compelling content is through structured storytelling frameworks.
Here are four powerful approaches specifically designed for B2B contexts:
1. StoryBrand Framework
Donald Miller's StoryBrand positions the customer as the hero of the story, with your company as the guide. This framework is particularly effective for translating complex technical capabilities into customer-centric narratives.
Key elements:
- Character (customer) with a problem
- Meets a guide (your company)
- Who gives them a plan
- And calls them to action
- That helps them avoid failure
- And ends in success
Application for SME content: When interviewing experts, structure questions around these elements rather than product features. Ask: "What problems do customers face that our solution addresses?" rather than "What features does our product have?"
Once SME data is collected, the next step is transforming technical details into a clear, engaging narrative that connects with your audience.
AI tools like Yarnit support this process by transforming raw information into compelling, audience-focused messaging.Using the Ask Yarnit feature, marketers can quickly generate StoryBrand-style narratives. Just use a prompt like:
Prompt for B2B marketers: "Take the technical specification document for [product] and reframe it as a StoryBrand narrative where the customer is facing [specific challenge] and our solution guides them to [desired outcome]."
2. Public Narrative Framework
Developed by Marshall Ganz, this framework connects personal experience, collective identity, and urgent challenges. It's particularly effective for thought leadership content from SMEs.
Key elements:
- Story of Self: Personal experience and values
- Story of Us: Shared challenges and aspirations
- Story of Now: Urgent challenges requiring action
Structure expert interviews to extract personal experiences with industry challenges, perspectives on collective industry concerns, and views on immediate priorities.
Prompt for B2B marketers: "Help our technical expert craft a thought leadership piece that connects their personal journey in developing [solution], our industry's shared challenge with [problem], and why solving this issue is critical right now."
3. Before & After Grid
Ryan Deiss's framework maps the customer's transformation across multiple dimensions, making it ideal for case studies and solution-oriented content.
Key elements: Define the customer's state before and after using your solution across dimensions of:
- What they have
- How they feel
- Average day experience
- Status
- Good vs. evil (challenges overcome)
Use this framework when interviewing customers for case studies, ensuring you capture both technical metrics and experiential improvements.
Prompt for B2B marketers: "Transform the technical results from our customer implementation into a Before & After narrative that contrasts their operational challenges before our solution with their improved state after implementation."
4. Pitch the Promised Land
Andy Raskin's framework focuses on the aspirational future state your solution enables, making it perfect for visionary content from technical leaders.
Key elements:
- Name the enemy (current problem or outdated approach)
- Show the promised land (desirable future)
- Outline obstacles to reaching that future
- Introduce features as "magic gifts" to overcome obstacles
- Present evidence that you can deliver
This framework works exceptionally well for product launches and innovation announcements where technical capabilities need to be connected to business transformation.
Prompt for B2B marketers: "Help our product expert articulate how [new feature/product] transforms [industry process], outlining the current limitations, the ideal future state, and how our unique approach overcomes the barriers to that transformation."
Transforming Content From Expert to Audience
Creating a repeatable process for transforming expert knowledge into marketing content is essential for scaling your efforts. Here's a structured approach:
Phase 1: Research & Preparation
- Audience needs assessment: Analyze search data, customer questions, and sales conversations to identify information gaps your SME content should address.
- Knowledge inventory: Map available internal expertise against audience needs to identify priority areas for content development.
- Expert profiling: Document each SME's communication style, interests, and preferred collaboration methods to optimize the extraction process.
Phase 2: SME Alignment
- Goals alignment: Ensure SMEs understand how their contributions support business objectives and audience needs.
- Format selection: Choose knowledge extraction methods that match your experts' preferences: interviews, written responses, collaborative workshops, or recorded presentations.
- Expectation setting: Create clear timelines and commitment scopes that respect SMEs' primary responsibilities.
Phase 3: Structured Collaboration
- Template-driven extraction: Develop standardized questionnaires and interview guides aligned with your chosen storytelling frameworks.
- Facilitated workshops: Conduct group sessions where marketing and technical experts collaborate on translating complex concepts.
- Iterative review process: Establish efficient feedback loops that capture technical corrections without disrupting narrative flow.
Phase 4: Content Exchange & Repurposing
- Central knowledge repository: Create a searchable library of SME insights that can be repurposed across multiple content pieces.
- Modular content approach: Break expert contributions into reusable components that can be recombined for different channels and formats.
- Cross-functional visibility: Ensure sales and customer success teams can easily access and leverage expert content in their customer interactions.
To streamline this process, AI-powered tools like Yarnit can support content teams by repurposing modular content into platform-ready formats—turning blog posts into infographics, long-form articles into social snippets, or webinars into podcasts—while maintaining brand consistency and optimizing for each channel.
How AI Can Help in B2B Content Marketing
Artificial intelligence is revolutionizing how organizations scale their expert content creation. According to Content Marketing Institute's 2025 B2B Content Marketing Benchmarks report, 81% of B2B marketers are now using generative AI tools, up from 72% the previous year.
By automatically transcribing and analyzing expert interviews, AI tools reduce manual processing time, while also having the capability to transform technically complex explanations into more accessible content without compromising accuracy.
AI systems can develop initial drafts from limited SME input, allowing experts to focus on refinement rather than starting from scratch, and can analyze existing technical documentation to extract marketable insights with minimal direct SME involvement.
Teams can also produce 2-3x more expert-informed content with the same resources. Also, while creating the content, AI tools can optimize it for search visibility and audience engagement.
Yarnit's Knowledge Hub transforms how organizations capture and utilize expert knowledge. By creating a structured system for documenting SME insights, companies protect valuable expertise from being lost when team members transition. The platform serves as a central repository where technical knowledge becomes an accessible organizational asset rather than remaining isolated with individual experts.
Yarnit's can also help create questionnaires; particularly valuable for knowledge capture. These targeted question sets break complex topics into manageable components using domain-specific terminology, extracting both explicit and tacit knowledge efficiently.
The Knowledge Hub effectively bridges technical expertise and content creation by converting specialized information into clear language while maintaining accuracy. This transformation process makes complex material accessible to broader audiences without sacrificing technical integrity.
It then uses AI to convert complex ideas into engaging, audience-ready content by using Knowledge Nuggets to condense the information. Using this can simplify review workflows, minimizing SME involvement while maintaining quality.
The Future of Expert Content Marketing
The ability to effectively transform complex expert knowledge into compelling, accessible content represents a significant competitive advantage in B2B marketing. As content demands increase and attention spans decrease, organizations that excel at this transformation will stand out in crowded marketplaces.
The future of B2B content marketing lies at the intersection of deep expertise and accessible communication. As AI-driven systems continue to evolve, the organizations that thrive will be those that strategically combine human expertise with technological capabilities—creating content that is both technically authoritative and remarkably easy to understand.
